While Maggie recorded the data I was arranging it and transmitting it to the calculator room for analysis. I was much too busy even to attempt a horse-back evaluation in my head. There was a short wait while the analysts finished programming and let the “brain” have it-then the remote-printer in front of me chattered briefly and stopped. Huxley leaned across me and tore off the tape before I could reach it.
He glanced at it, then cleared his throat and waited for dead silence. “Brethren,” he began, “comrades—we agreed long ago on our doctrine of procedure. When every predictable factor, calculated, discounted for probable error, weighted and correlated with all other significant factors, gave a calculated risk of two to one in our favor, we would strike. Today’s solution of the probability equation, substituting this week’s data for the variables, gives an answer of two point one three. I propose to set the hour of execution. How say you?”
It was a delayed shock; no one said anything. Hope delayed too long makes reality hard to believe—and all of these men had waited for years, some for most of a lifetime. Then they were on their feet, shouting, sobbing, cursing, pounding each others” backs.
Huxley sat still until they quieted, an odd little smile on his face. Then he stood up and said quietly, “I don’t think we need poll the sentiment. I will set the hour after I have—“General! If you please. I do not agree.” It was Zeb’s boss, Sector General Novak, Chief of Psych. Huxley stopped speaking and the silence fairly ached. I was as stunned as the rest.
Then Huxley said quietly, “This council usually acts by unanimous consent. We have long since arrived at the method for setting the date . . . but I know that you would not disagree without good reason. We will listen now to Brother Novak.”
Novak came slowly forward and faced them. “Brethren,” he began, running his eyes over bewildered and hostile faces, “you know me, and you know I want this thing as much as you do. I have devoted the last seventeen years to it—it has cost me my family and my home. But I can’t let you go ahead without warning you, when I am sure that the time is not yet. I think-no, I know with mathematical certainty that we are not ready for revolution.” He had to wait and hold up both hands for silence; they did not want to hear him. “Hear me out! I concede that all military plans are ready. I admit that if we strike now we have a strong probability of being able to seize the country. Nevertheless we are not ready—”
“Why not?”
“—because a majority of the people still believe in the established religion, they believe in the Divine authority of the Prophet. We can seize power but we can’t hold it.”
“The Devil we won’t!”
“Listen to me! No people was ever held in subjection long except through their own consent. For three generations the American people have been conditioned from cradle to grave by the cleverest and most thorough psychotechnicians in the world. They believe! If you turn them loose now, without adequate psychological preparation, they will go back to their chains . . . like a horse returning to a burning barn. We can win the revolution but it will be followed by a long and bloody civil war—which we will lose!”
He stopped, ran a trembling hand across his eyes, then said to Huxley, “That’s all.”
Several were on their feet at once. Huxley pounded for order, then recognized Wing General Penoyer.
Penoyer said, “I’d like to ask Brother Novak a few questions.”
“Go ahead.”
“Can his department tell us what percentage of the population is sincerely devout?”
Zebadiah, present to assist his chief, looked up; Novak nodded and he answered, “sixty-two percent, plus-or-minus three percent.”
“And the percentage who secretly oppose the government whether we have enlisted them or not?”
“Twenty-one percent plus, proportional error. The balance can be classed as conformists, not devout but reasonably contented.”
“By what means were the data obtained?”
“Surprise hypnosis of representative types.”
“Can you state the trend?”
“Yes, sir. The government lost ground rapidly during the first years of the present depression, then the curve flattened out. The new tithing law and to some extent the vagrancy decrees were unpopular and the government again lost ground before the curve again flattened at a lower level. About that time business picked up a little but we simultaneously started our present intensified propaganda campaign; the government has been losing ground slowly but steadily the past fifteen months.”
“And what does the first derivative show?”
Zeb hesitated and Novak took over. “You have to figure the second derivative,” he answered in a strained voice; “the rate is accelerating.”
“Well?”
The Psych Chief answered firmly but reluctantly, “On extrapolation, it will be three years and eight months before we can risk striking.”
Penoyer turned back to Huxley. “I have my answer, sir. With deep respect to General Novak and his careful scientific work, I say-win while we can! We may never have another chance.”
He had the crowd with him. “Penoyer is right! If we wait, we’ll be betrayed.”—“You can’t hold a thing like this together forever.”—“I’ve been underground ten years; I don’t want to be buried here.”—“Win—. . . and worry about making converts when we control communications.”—“strike now! Strike now!”
Huxley let them carry on, his own face expressionless, until they had it out of their systems. I kept quiet myself, since I was too junior to be entitled to a voice here, but I went along with Penoyer; I couldn’t see waiting nearly four years.
I saw Zeb talking earnestly with Novak. They seemed to be arguing about something and were paying no attention to the racket. But when Huxley at last held up a hand for silence Novak left his place and hurried up to Huxley’s elbow. The General listened for a moment, seemed almost annoyed, then undecided. Novak crooked a finger at Zeb, who came running up. The three whispered together for several moments while the council waited.
Finally Huxley faced them again. “General Novak has proposed a scheme which may change the whole situation. The Council is recessed until tomorrow.”
Novak’s plan (or Zeb’s, though he never admitted authorship) required a delay of nearly two months, to the date of the annual Miracle of the Incarnation. For what was contemplated was no less than tampering with the Miracle itself. In hindsight it was an obvious and probably essential strategem; the psych boss was right. In essence, a dictator’s strength depends not upon guns but on the faith his people place in him. This had been true of Caesar, of Napoleon, of Hitler, of Stalin. It was necessary to strike first at the foundation of the Prophet’s power: the popular belief that he ruled by direct authority of God.
Future generations will undoubtedly find it impossible to believe the importance, the extreme importance both to religious faith and political power, of the Miracle of Incarnation. To comprehend it even intellectually it is necessary to realize that the people literally believed that the First Prophet actually and physically returned from Heaven once each year to judge the stewardship of his Divinely appointed successor and to confirm him in his office. The people believed this—the minority of doubters dared not open their faces to dispute it for fear of being torn limb from limb . . . and I am speaking of a rending that leaves blood on the pavement, not some figure of speech. Spitting on the Flag would have been much safer.
I had believed it myself, all my life; it would never have occurred to me to doubt such a basic article of faith—and I was what is called an educated man, one who had been let into the secrets of and trained in the production of lesser miracles. I believed it.